London, (Samajweekly) The European Commission (EC) and Intel have been having a spat since 2009 regarding the latter’s rebate practices which, at the time, prompted the EC to say Intel was abusing its dominant market position and now the EC has confirmed it will be appealing that motion.
According to Windows Central, a legal squabble nearly a decade and a half in the making now has another chapter. The EC has confirmed it is appealing a decision made earlier in 2022 about a case that’s been gestating since 2009.
Back in 2009, Intel attracted the attention of the EC due to the company’s rebate schemes that, the way the EC saw it, were creating an unfair competitive disadvantage for AMD.
Intel did not agree with the $1.2 billion verdict that it was abusing marketplace dominance and fought against the fine in a back-and-forth that went on for years, the report said.
Fast-forward to 2022, and the European Union’s General Court overturned the fine because there was not a conclusive case that Intel’s rebate activities concretely disadvantaged AMD in ways deserving of such a massive fine.
“The General Court concluded that that evidence is capable of giving rise to doubt in the mind of the Court as to the result of [the EC’s] assessment, finding, therefore, the evidence relied on by the Commission to conclude that the rebates granted to Dell were capable of having a foreclosure effect throughout the whole of the relevant period to be insufficient,” the report quoted General Court’s press release on the matter.
In other words, Intel’s activities and the contested window of time they took place in weren’t effectively proven by the EC to be the epicenter of anticompetitive practice the Commission was claiming them to be. And so, the fine got dropped.A
But now, as confirmed to The Register by an EC spokesperson, that overturn is being appealed. The battle rages on.
